James Austin Johnson: Scooby Dooby Doo

I haven't seen the hockey one with the guys that are kissing. You know, we don't watch it. We haven't seen it. We don't know anything about it. But when we watch it, we watch it. We go, we love this, but we've never looked at it. We don't watch it. Hey, everybody. Welcome to Literally. It is Literally Me today. So years ago, I stumbled on YouTube to a young man named James Austin Johnson, and he was doing his Donald Trump. It was the funniest. I put it on my phone. I played it for everybody. It made me laugh. It remains one of my favorite. And he's obviously since gone on to be a huge hit on SNL with his Donald Trump and other impersonations. But if you're going to listen to this, I urge you to listen to his James Austin Johnson, Donald Trump, Scooby-Doo. He talks about the show, Scooby-Doo. It's amazing. So I've always wanted to talk to him, and I finally have him on the show. Here we go. How's life? Are you in the middle of the season up in New York or what's going on? Yeah, we just hit a three-week break. It's the Olympics. And so SNL has taken almost a month off. And that's great. I'm so pumped. I love doing my job and I love not doing my job. Those are the two things that I love the most. What are you going to do with your time off? Are you going to do some clubs? Are you writing? What are you doing, man? Are you just chilling? I have a four-year-old. Uh-oh, well, say no more. So I'm going to spend a week with the four-year-old and my wife here in New York. And then I'm going to go to LA for a week to kind of like do LA stuff. I lived there for 10 years. So all my friends are out there. And my wife's just kind of sending me to go do stuff I want to go do in LA. and then I'll come back and we'll have another week in New York and then I'll be back to work. It's such an amazing conveyor belt being on SNL. It is a crazy schedule. You hosted. Yeah, I did. I think I did it three times. Yeah. Super fun. And I always liked the people who were doing the... I was there during the Daryl Hammond era. Daryl, one of the best to ever do it. But, you know, that was, I was, my impressions of Daryl's impressions is like the beginning of my comedy journey. You know what I mean? Does everybody who does impressions, I think you're right. I think you eventually, you start doing somebody else's impression of the person as opposed to your own impression of the person. I think that's what lets you in. I think hearing someone adapt it is what teaches your ear kind of like how to hook in to someone else's voice. You know, the natural tone of a great character actor, you're mesmerized. So it's not like you're, you know, really listening for all the quirks and trying to figure out how to do that person. But once an impressionist kind of drills in that first kind of inch of concrete and finds the hook and you hear it and you hear what they heard, I think that's what teaches your ear to start listening for those quirks. And I think that's kind of what opens the door to the beautiful world of impressions. it's it's uh it's funny i've had dana on and uh all other folks who do great impressions like you and it's it's always interesting to me to hear the process because everybody's process is both similar and really different yeah there's there's a couple things that are that are always the same you know um uh you need tape you need tape because you need to be able to like hear the same phrase over and over and i think everybody kind of agrees that that's sort of where it starts is like, well, I'm obsessed with the way that Christopher Walken does this. And so I'm going to listen to this line from this movie over and over. I think that's always been what people did. But I mean, I would say that I specifically benefit from YouTube, you know, in a way that those guys weren't. They didn't have YouTube. I have like a machine in my pocket and I can keep hitting replay on some podcast clip or some interview clip. And I kind of, as far as my process goes, I mean, I pay for the nice YouTube so that I can have it playing with my phone locked. You know what I mean? That's one of the features you get with the premium. You got to get on YouTube premium. Okay, I'm getting, I'm making a note to myself. It's worth the money. I got to step up my game. And so I just hit play. And, you know, the last guy that I've really been doing it with is Javier Bardem. I've become kind of obsessed with, I bet I've got a funny Javier Bardem in there somewhere. What made you go, he's my next target? I saw F1 twice in the theater. Maybe this is like, I'm a dad and I'm getting a little bit older. Not that F1 is just for older guys. I just mean like, I went to F1 alone twice. Yeah, no. And no, the fact that you went to F1, it's like, that tells me, yeah, you've got a four-year-old. You're a dad. I'm a dad. You might even have a minivan. You went to F1 in the theaters. I don't have a minivan, but I do have a truck and I have a sedan. And when I was, you know, we take our breaks in Nashville a lot of the time. That's where I'm from. And yeah, I went to a couple, there were a couple nights during one of the breaks, whenever F1 came out, where I put our son down and my wife was like, all right, I'm zonked. I'm going to bed. And I'm still awake because I'm on SNL and I'm on Lorne Hours. I'm a night owl now. That's what he did to me. And so I just kept going to the theater to see F1 and I just became obsessed with Javier Bardem's Spanish accent and the suits and the way that he's friends with Brad, but he's his boss. And I just got really, I started just walking around New York for the last couple of weeks. I've just been walking around New York under my breath just going, Brad Pitt, you're driving the car too fast. You're driving the car way too fast. You explode the car all over the racetrack. It's like the dumbest, it's Frankenstein is what I'm doing. I'm doing the dumbest possible version of Ayer Bardem. It's very erudite, serious actor and I'm reducing him to this homunculus. But that's also one of the great moves. That's Dana reducing President Bush to agandha. Agandha. Agandha. Just reducing them to an idiot. That's comedy. And no shade on Javier Bardem, one of the greatest actors ever, ever, ever. But, you know, every once in a while, I'm like looking on YouTube and I find some clip. one of the clips that me and Andrew Dismukes, who share an office at SNL that we've watched a million times, is Javier on Conan talking about all the metal bands that he likes. He's like, oh yeah, I love metal bands. I love Pantera, AC Dishi, Le Zeppelin, Deep Purple. Like, he says, Deep Purple. Deep Purple. Deep Purple. AC Dishi. It's, I had a, there was a foreign when I was a kid a foreign exchange student came to our school and she was living with some whatever some family and we were trying to relate to her it must have been like the seventh grade and like who do you like and she kept saying like what movies do you like he goes Mikael Douglas Mikael Douglas Mikael Mikael Douglas and it took me forever to realize she was saying Michael Douglas yeah that's a that's a sophisticated choice yeah Mikael of all things could have been anybody Mikael Douglas Yeah, I remember my mom had a moment like that. They take care of some kids from Guatemala who are immigrant students at the college that my dad works at. And my mom was like asking them, you know, what's your favorite food? I want to make it for you. What's your favorite food? What would you guys want on Sunday? And the girl kept saying this like Spanish word. My mom couldn't understand what it was. And she started like asking the other students and she finally figured out that she was translating a, it's like a guinea pig. It's some kind of indigenous big rodent from like the mountains in Peru where she's from. It is a guinea pig. It is an actual guinea pig. Yes, I've had it there. You've had, have you had the roasted guinea pig down there? I have, 100% have. How did it strike you? The classic cliche, a lot like chicken. A lot like chicken, man. I'm a foodie. I love food. I love restaurants. I love cooking. I have not yet gotten to sample any rodent, really. And by the way, it's not like some obscure delicacy there. It's not. No. You can get it anywhere. It's plentiful. There's a lot of them. It's like, you know, I guess venison is exotic to certain city dwellers here in America. But in rural areas, no, there's lots of venison because there's lots of deer. and that's a meat. That's a meat that people crave. Yeah, but at least they've done the thing where they've given it a euphemism. It's venison. It's a fucking deer, dude. This is like, no, this is an actual guinea pig. They're not calling it anucolagli or whatever. It's like, they tell you what you're getting. Well, it's a guinea pig. All right, what is this? It says guinea pig here with fingerling potatoes and haricot vert. So what is the guinea pig made of? It's guinea pig. Yeah, I know. I know. I see it's got like potatoes and green beans, but the guinea pig, that's like a cornish hen or? No, it's a guinea pig. It's a guinea pig. Okay. So I'm going to be eating? A guinea pig, sir. A guinea pig. Okay. Yes, sir. Okay. I think I'm going to have this. This is a guinea pig. How many for like the table? Like how many would we need? You don't know what it helps. You don't know how many, how big they are? You've certainly seen them before. Is it like, okay, end of scene. Rob, how many guinea pigs can you eat in one meal? I barely finished one pig. We're talking like maybe the size of a baked potato. They look like a fucking, they look like a baked potato. They 100% do. I bet it's great. I bet it's great. You know, my grandpa grew up in the Depression, on a farm in the Depression in Alabama, and he talks very, he talked very plainly of eating squirrels. Squirrel. Oh, I grew up in Ohio, and there were lots of folks who came from Kentucky. And I have one of my vivid childhood memories is walking through my friend's house and looking in the sink, and there were skin squirrels. This is like in suburban Dayton, Ohio. Okay. All right. Well, they don't carry disease squirrels. As far as I know. Who knows? They carry nuts. In their mouths. In their mouths. And hey, nut-fed squirrel. That's a clean diet. I know where the food's coming from. Some Maha shit. Bring back. Yeah. That's about to be the next headline. Is there... RFK says embrace squirrel meat. Embrace squirrel. Is there any impression that you go, no, no, no, that's low-hanging fruit. I'm not doing it. Like RFK Jr. would come to mind. Yeah, he's got such a distinct thing. I don't think I can do RFK in the way that I do impressions. I have certain standards. You wouldn't know it from hearing me do Javier Bardem a few seconds ago. Seconds ago, yes. But I have some certain standards. Like if I'm going to do something on SNL, I want it to be as dialed in as possible. You know, that said, they just throw things at me. Sometimes you're coming in on Saturday and they're like, you're doing Chuck Grassley tonight. And I didn't even, it's like, okay, I follow Chuck Grassley on Twitter because I think he's a hilarious Twitter follower. But I don't know. Have you done Lindsey Graham? I've done Lindsey Graham a bunch of times. I feel like that's right in the sweet spot. It is. And it might surprise you that when, you know, to the casual listener, you hear somebody like RFK or Lindsey Graham, you hear such a distinct set of vocal quirks and tones. You go, oh, that's easy. I can do a clumsy version of it and be funny. Sometimes those are the guys that I most want to do really unique and accurately. I almost want to spend so much more time doing the ones where there's sort of a hacky starter version available. So some of them I really take my time. And even if I've done it once on the show, I'm like, the next time I do that, I want it to be even more dialed in. Do you feel like, because how I first discovered you, you were not even on SNL. Scooby-Doo, he doesn't do. He doesn't do much. He doesn't do. It's a very bad deal. Scooby. They take the mask off and then the guy. Yeah, that's. And it was not so nice to Mr. Coolio. Okay, so Donald Trump. This is a great example of what we're talking about. Donald Trump is, however you feel about him politically or his policies, one of the weirdest people alive. He's a very strange, he's an odd man. He has odd hair. He has an odd presentation. He has an odd voice. He has odd obsessions. You know, he's very manly, and yet he's fixated on Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals. All of these, like, interesting things that all just kind of come together and make this gentleman that we know and love. So everybody had their hacky Donald Trump that they do. You know, China, China. Everybody had their hacky Donald Trump that they do. And I thought you know I could probably do that but everyone else is doing it This is like 2016 Everyone else is doing it I don know I keep playing with it and see if I find something And so I was doing a very hacky, you know. They're coming and they're going to get you. They're going to get us. They're terrible. I was doing the same Donald Trump everybody else does. And for whatever reason, I just couldn't stop doing it under my breath. And that ended up lasting his whole first term for years. Just like every other day, I would try some new little contour on my impression of Trump. And this, in many ways, this impression that I am now most famous for is probably my signature bit on SNL and elsewhere. That was the product of years of playing around with it. And so it is very second nature to me now. It's become very sophisticated in time. And you may not realize that I probably worked on that one the hardest and the longest. And it was, I mean, the biggest breakthrough was the content of the impression. After I had figured out sonically what it was, the next level for a person like me, an actor first, who does impressions second. You know, the actor side of me wanted like something to do, wanted like, wanted a personality, wanted a mindset, wanted to like settle into the character. and so it's almost, I would, maybe this is pretentious, but I almost describe it as like, I don't necessarily feel like I'm doing an impression of Donald Trump. It's more like a Donald Trump character that I do. Right, yeah. Because he has an inner life and he has like things he's obsessed with. My Donald Trump is much more of like a pop culture blogger than... He's a little bit like Larry King in the day. It's like, it's definitely got Larry King and it's like a little bit Howard Stern. And it's also like a vulture, like a vulture, like dot com, vulture.com, like a vulture.com, like TV reviewer. Like it's very much plugged into like, like my Donald Trump on SNL probably watches every episode of RuPaul's Drag Race and and or and. I haven't seen the hockey one with the guys that are kissing you know we don't watch it we haven't seen it we don't know anything about it but a lot of people really like it and when we watch it we watch it we go we love this but we've never looked at it we don't watch the show it's one of our favorite shows it's one of our favorite shows that's like even that thing that's one of like 30 modules that I use in my Donald Trump voice the double speak the like saying yes I do it saying no I don't and saying it at the same time. That's something that he does all the time. He's like, we have to stop the Senate runoff. We've got to stop this awful Senate runoff and defeat the Democrats. And then the next day they're interviewing me. And he's like, what was it? You're telling me for the first time there was a Senate in Texas and we lost? I don't know anything about it. We don't follow that. We're not looking into that. We'll be looking into that very shortly. I can assure you that it's very important, but we don't know anything about it. That's just like one of the games that will tug out in a cold open to kind of, you know, conjure Donald Trump for everybody. When you came in with the two most famous YouTube ones, the Scooby-Doo, of course. Yeah. He drives the van. He doesn't drive the story. They should call the show Velma. They should call the show Velma. Velma's doing all the work. And then, of course, the Weird Al Yankovic one is also. Oh, yeah. Weird Al was not very nice to Coolio. Yeah. Yeah, that was like, Rob, that was like pandemic in LA. I know, you have a mask on, I think. I have a mask on outside. See, that tells you where in 2020. Yeah. Because it was like before we learned that we could just have a mask off outside, I didn't even know I could necessarily go outside. You know, we would like peer through the blinds and see people jogging outside, But it was like, we're waiting for the scientists to tell us what the thing is. Yeah, when those smart people figure it out, we'll do it. Once they figure it out. And so once I learned it was okay for me to go on walks, I love walks. And that's where all of the comedy comes from for me. And so I just started walking around Glendale just for an hour or two every day. Doing voices. It didn't matter because it was like the world was over. So it was like, I can walk around and mutter. And, you know, now the pandemic's over and I do the same thing in New York. It's just there's much more of a precedent in New York for walking around muttering under your breath. I was going to say, you fit right in. I fit right in. Did you have a moment where, I just had this, I had this imagining this scene where Lauren's like, look, we're not fucking YouTube, okay? So all of that kind of, you know, sort of tangential, look, Donald Trump, people know who he is. You've got to, you can't start rambling about, you know, you need to, he's in the Oval after all. I love you, Trump. I love you, Trump. Hey, let me tell you, I got an, this is something I've noticed is that people's Trump impressions are rooted in the moment that they, that their relationship began with Donald Trump, right? And so I'm hearing your Donald Trump. I'm doing, that was my Lorne, by the way. So, oh, I do this all the time in my head. I get them Freudian swapped. Because they're both my boss. Yeah, they're both, you're doing both. No, but Lorne would be like, look, I remember. Yes, everyone's Lorne is rooted in the moment that they met Lorne. And so, you know, you do the Lorne that you do, which is a very familiar Lorne, I think, to all of us. Yes. And the Lorne that I do is, you know, when I met him, he was, well, are you married? Do you have children? Oh my God, that's amazing. And when's the baby due? Okay. And then he looked up at his calendar and he was like, all right, well, you'll have the baby during the Christmas break and then you'll be back. And there'll be a lot of wigs. So like, you know, that's... That's a great, that is a unbelievable. I've never heard that version of a Lorne. That's amazing. I've updated the Lorne. No, you have. You've completely reimagined it. He's always got some edamame. He's munching on some McLease or something. He's always got a crunchy snack around. So I always try to remember when I'm doing my Lorne impression to be mid-chew. Like to be, I'm eating something when I'm talking. Because often when I meet with him, he's got some snacking and he's talking to me. It's an award show. I think if we present you in an award show, that opens it up. And that allows us, you know, like this is kind of how he manages the show. And snacking is important. I mean, you got to, we're always at the show. We are running around. We're on our feet. We're standing just for hours at a time. And you got to remember to just keep munching on some crunchy snacks because you need those calories. I invested in Tootsie Roll. It's one of the few. I got into Tipsy Roll early and... They do one thing. They do one thing. And people love it. And they expect it. And they deliver. It's all true. These are not even bits. It's not not true. No. It's true. My fantasy is to do an evening with... To produce and be an evening with Lorne Michaels. but it's everybody who we all love doing our versions of Lauren. That would be great. Like a, like a marathon, almost like a Mark Twain, one man show, but we're swapping out. Yes. And you're just swapping out and you're doing, and everything you're doing is your, like, like the, I'm not making it up. You want, I was on a walk, speaking of walks, I was on a walk with him and for, for one nanosecond, it was silent. Yeah. And in fact, you know, there, there's, there's nothing more violent than a tree. Yeah. it's a direct quote of course that's right what can be more violent than a tree it's you know that elder will eventually choke that maple oh my god that's incredible is that how maybe that's how he views himself in the Hollywood firmament is a mighty oak that just keeps growing and dwarfs the trees around it and chokes them all of the sunlight and eventually becomes the tree at the center of the universe. Yeah, he's the Rockefeller Center fucking tree. But how great would that be? You'd be down for that. Wouldn't that be amazing? I'm in a heartbeat. I think all the time about kind of what my, you know, I would love to do, I would love to do a one-man show like that, where you take, that's sort of what I mean by what is the height of using this dumb kindergarten playground skill, this cartwheel that is impressions. What's really the height that you can reach in that skill? And I would say probably Jamie Foxx and Ray, that's the height that you can expect from being a guy who's good at impressions. Jamie Foxx, one of the greatest stand-ups, great entertainer, and he was able to take this impressions thing he does. and he did this heartbreaking, tragic, triumphant, generation-spanning story with one of his impressions. I would love to do a movie like that and at the very least, I'm shooting for... I would love a Broadway show where I could do Trump as a Broadway show 25 years from now or something like that. You know, like whenever we've taken a breath and the public, the general public is ready to like crack back open that Donald Trump comedy chest, you know, I'll be there ready to be like, all right, let's do the Donald Trump show. Yeah, a reimagining of it like I guess Will did with Bush, right? Yeah, he did, right? Thank you, America. And that's something that Martin Short has encouraged me to pursue. Martin Short, every time he sees me, he's like, you should do, you should think about what the Broadway show of Donald Trump is. And of course, it would be a Phantom of the Opera style Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. I'm very clear about this. I think you're clearly, that's the bullseye, is it not? That's the bullseye, yeah. Slowly, gently. I got to sing Phantom as Donald Trump towards the beginning of the season, and it was a very triumphant moment for me. I don't think anybody had really heard my musical theater training, and I've been able to bust that out a few times this season. I've gotten to sing on some people, and that's been kind of a delight. I'm having a really fun season this year, just sort of stretching out and trying out new things, you know? I've thrown my hat into the ring to do Gavin Newsom when the time comes. You and me need to do a Gavin Newsom off live on TV, and the winner takes over California. Let's do that. But I've got to, you know, they're up there. They're doing it. You know, it's way back here. It's not far off really from Obama. It's almost like if you put RFK here and Obama here. That's right. Gavin Newsom's kind of on a slider between those two voices because there's some of those choked, you know, choked, restricted things that are happening to RFK's voice. And then you've also got the laid back, kind of laid back of the throat kind of guy that Barack Obama was doing, the pilot voice. He's also got the tough guy affectation, which Obama did, but he did it for, like when Obama started dropping his Gs, by the way, I knew the minute he started dropping his Gs, he was full of shit. Like the minute any politician starts dropping their Gs, just know this, you're about to get lied to. I don't care what side of the aisle you're on. When they talk about we're going instead of going, they're pulling one over. We're going. Yeah, Obama in the second term, I think in the second term is when I heard him say the phrase, folks want to pop off. And I was like, all right, you're not going to face the voters ever again. So you're busting out the folks want to pop off. But that's so good. Folks want to pop off. And so he was just trying out some new phraseology. When you got those general elections ahead of you, you tighten up and you really try to take a certain kind of posture. And then once he was in that second term, he was like, bye Felicia. He was just trying out little slang moments that are always fun. And it's, I think that's like, that's why you got to take Donald Trump seriously that he really does want to go for a third term because he's still campaigning to win one more election. Like in a typical president's second term, they take on a different personality because they're a lame duck and they go, oh, I'm not going to run again. I can't face the voters again. So I'm this type, I'm about to retire. I'm about to be one of these guys that just goes and speaks at a Goldman Sachs retreat or something. That's what they do after they're done. Donald Trump is convinced that when he is 89, he will still be needing to lead. And so that's something that I still think. It's like you can hear the ferociousness in his voice that he still feels that he needs to brawl every single day. Which is sad because I want... what we all want for Donald Trump, which is for him to relax and enjoy his life. I think Republican What would that be like What Donald Trump relaxing post What are you up to Donald What are you doing You know what This is this is wonderful And we never been doing better And honestly I think what we want to hear and what the American people want from me is pizza It pizza Friday and we're all going to eat pizza. Everyone look in your bank accounts. You all have $35. And right now, if you enter into the dominoes using promo code, Donald, Donna knows you will get three medium pizzas, two topping each for $35. It's an incredible deal. You got to take them up on it. And we're not invading anybody. We don't need Greenland. We're fine with whatever Europe's doing. Who cares? We're not doing crypto. What we're doing is pizza. We're going to eat pizza Friday. We're going to come together. He would be, I think. The sniffle. The little, the like sniffle at the end. The Adderall sniffle. Yeah, you got to suck the spit. You got to put the spit from the front of your mouth back to the back of your mouth. That's the inhale. And yeah, it's always a little congested. I think he likes Afrin, which is that thing that only clears your nose while you're using it. And you're addicted to it. Afrin's really addicting. It's really addicting. Really, really, really addicting, Afrin. You know Nate Bargatze, right? Yeah, sure. Yeah, Nate Bargatze talks about how his dad is fully Afrin hooked. It's such an old-timey... It's not a dangerous drug to be hooked on. It's kind of a cute drugstore drug to be hooked on, Afrin. It's like being hooked on Benadryl or something. Yeah, Tylenol PM. Tylenol PM. him. So yeah, apparently that's one of the things that I've heard about Donald Trump in my research is that he says that he doesn't drink, he doesn't do drugs, but he is kind of obsessed with over the counter medications. And he kind of has a rotation of safe sprays and pills that he's always moving through. He hits that red button on the desk and starts asking for it to be brought and bring me the Afrin, right? Bring me the Afrin and a Diet Coke. Just dump an Afrin straight in the Diet Coke. He's got the Diet Coke button. He's probably got a Diet Coke IV. That's probably what the purple stain is, right? That's from the Diet Coke. He gets like two liters of Diet Coke injected every day. Who else is in your panthenon of, you mentioned Christopher Walken. That's a starter one, right? That's what everybody starts on. I don't have a great Christopher Walken because that's one of those ones that I would really like to find a new one. You know what I mean? And so I think Jay Moore is who really broke Christopher Walken for people. I think Jay Moore really popularized the Walken. And, you know, the one that everybody does. Wow, you know, like the thing that everybody does. And when I do Christopher Walken myself, it's again like all my impressions it's like the older it's the more recent version of Christopher Walken you know like from what's the show the Apple show I always blank on what it's called Severance yeah so Severance Walken is kind of what I what I do the most and that's really whispery you know what I mean that's it's very low it's almost English earth. Can I speak to you for a moment? Just have a moment of your time. That's what I'm interested in, but I don't play with the Christopher Walken a whole lot because I'm like, when am I going to use it? Jay Moore already has the best one and everybody does his walken. The ones that I really am obsessed with and I do all the time these days, Billy Bob Thornton. I don't know how many times I've done Landman Billy Bob at the SNL table. We've never quite found the piece to put it in. But I'm obsessed with the T-Mobile commercials with them walking around. Yeah. Everybody tells me that T-Mobile's got the most 5G towers than just about anybody else. I don't know anything about 5G towers or cell phones or any of that shit. As far as I'm concerned, it's all robot talk. But if you get a T-Mobile phone, it's probably going to work better than just about any goddamn phone you can probably pick up from any of these fucking places. Like, the way he is so kind of pissed off that he's even doing the T-Mobile commercial. That's what I'm upset. They got me out here in the middle of fucking nowhere and I'm still checking the phone and it still works. God damn it. Shit, this is crazy. So, that's the guy I've been doing the most lately. And, you know, we tried Paul Giamatti a bunch of times. I was always trying to get Paul Giamatti on, you know. That's a good one. What was the sketch that we wrote for Paul Giamatti? It was Andrew Dismukes and I wrote a sketch where it was Paul Giamatti giving a, this is too long of a setup, Paul Giamatti giving a shift meeting for the Chili's that he is a manager of. I love it. It's like Paul Giamatti is the general manager of a Chili's giving an all-hands meeting to all the waiters is like the sketch that we wrote. And it was like, you can't just change shifts with people without emailing me first, okay? If, Cassandra, if you don't want to work Sundays, you got to tell me that. Brian, I know that you have a soccer match. You know, like, it's that, it's Paul really out of breath, I think, is the Giamatti that I do the most. Have you worked with him? I have not worked with Paul Giamatti. That's crazy. That needs to be fixed. I know. He's an amazing actor. He's an amazing actor. And he's a great comedian, too. I have worked with Christopher Walken. I did a play with him. Oh, you did? Oh, you did. Rob. And he was very, he, what was his, I'm trying to think of what his quote was that was so insane for me. He had a lot of them. Yeah. He was really something. He lives up to the billing. He said one day, he said, I'd like to I have mine walking Do it, do it, do it You know I'd like to sing an American Indian song for you He said, what? He goes, but I'm going to do it al dente He says al dente and I think he meant a cappella Which is kind of unusual because he's a bona fide theater star, but he 100% I'll do it al dente. And then sang the song. Would you like me to sing the song he sung me? Because I remember it. You're never likely to. And coffee for two. That's what he sang. It's an absolutely true story. wonderful that is a great i i guess that's a dad joke unless he said it with the conviction of a real anecdote that he was treating very seriously in which case i go that is a beautiful song that is he loved it he absolutely loved it he thought it was the funniest thing ever i'm gonna sing it for you al dente Hey, that's a cappella. There was a legendary sketch. It was years ago, last time I hosted, that people still talked about that never made it to air on SNL where Walken played an alien. And the conceit was he was sent to, I'm trying to get this right. He was sent to tell the world that they came in peace. but every time he got out of the, took off, got off the ramp from the UFO, he got crushed to death. And it was, and he would like pull himself back onto the UFO and go, let's get out of here. But it was a very, so stupid. Like one of the stupidest sketches ever. But every time he hosted, it would make it right up to almost air and then get cut. Yeah, that's how it goes. there's certain things that are just absolute crushers that for whatever reason just keep not getting picked. And some things just don't make it past the table read, even though they are the funniest thing at the table read. And we have a process, and there's a million reasons why maybe that didn't end up going. Who knows? SNL is this organism, and it behaves strangely. And it's not just, even though Lorne is in charge and he's picking everything, there's other considerations at all times. You know, the space on the floor for sets and whether the host is still into it or the host likes another piece more. There's all these reasons why a sketch might not make it to the very end, even if everybody really wants it to. And that's just the reality of the show. And I think when you're first starting out as a cast member, it's really crushing when one of your pieces that did so well at the table just doesn't make it to live. But the longer you're able to hang, the longer you're there, the more you just kind of give in to the organism. And you're just like, hey, I am one mitochondria inside this soupy mass of life. And once you kind of lock into that, the whole show becomes more fun. You become less obsessed with your one piece in it and you become more like, all right, how can I serve these people? How can I be better in Sarah Sherman's sketch? How can I really deliver on this cold open that I only saw an hour ago and is about to go live? I love that I've gotten to this place where I have a more of a zen, mindful kind of leaf on the water sort of vibe with SNL. I was listening to Amy's Polarist podcast, and I forget who she had on, but one of the great gals from her era. And they were saying, both of them were saying their biggest regret is they didn't enjoy it more when they were there. Yeah. Yeah. And I get that. you know what it's like when you're an actor and you still feel like you gotta, I mean, I'm sure it never goes away, honestly, as an artist, that need to prove yourself and establish yourself. And I think when you're new, you're so obsessed with making sure that people see you how you want to be seen, you know, on your own terms. And that just becomes the only thing that you can even see and you've got blinders on. And I'm really grateful that I came to SNL, not in my 20s, when that would have been more dominant in my mind. I'm really glad that I came to SNL with a pregnant wife and well into my 30s. That kind of just... The fact that my fire had already been extinguished by maturity, I think helped me... I think that helps me at this point have that moment of clarity maybe sooner than it comes for other cast members. Do you still enjoy the table read where Lorne reads the stage? Does he still read the stage directions? Still reads the stage directions, and sometimes he doesn't, and you just kind of have to develop an ear for when to keep the pace of the scene moving if he's looking at something different than you or he's already in his mind thinking about, Oh, we should do this one. This one's actually great. I'm already in the meeting an hour from now. You know, like sometimes I think that that's what's going on is like, oh, he's the boss and he's already playing out scenarios. So maybe he's missing this one thing that we're all waiting at a half beat. We're all waiting for him to say, Michael Shea opens the door. You know, we're waiting for him to say that. But maybe he's already in the meeting and he's already plotting his plans. And so you develop the table read skill of keeping it moving of like, oh, Lauren might be late on that cue so I'm going to keep this moving. I forget who it was who was telling me that they would write a sketch just to hear Lauren read the stage direction. Do you ever hear this? We do that. Poopy baby butt walks in. Exactly. Or just whatever. Some phrase. The modern evolution of that, the thing that we've been doing, which is a shame to put this out in the public because now, you know, if it makes it back, maybe we don't get to do this fun game that we have anymore. But we love putting in the stage directions Lorne having to say that a female cast member looks beautiful. It happened one day where there was some sketch where Eggo and Heidi came in as beautiful models. And the stage direction, when he read it, we all loved it so much. And we were like, all right, we're doing that every table. It was something like, Ego and Heidi walk in legs for days. They both look stunning. And it was like, it was the way he said, Ego looks stunning. He kind of like went up a little bit, like he thought it was fun to say. He never goes up. After that, every like two or three tables, there would be a line in one sketch that was like, Sarah looks beautiful. Ashley looks gorgeous. Just because when he says it, it makes us all feel so warm. It's this wonderful family moment to hear. Our beautiful grandpa saying, beautiful. We all want daddy to tell us we're beautiful. The next thing will be him complimenting the men's looks. I think that's the evolution of that trend will be like, James looks handsome. I think that'll be the evolution of that trick. You have to have, that table read is so long. You have to have little bits in there that are for us, you know, that maybe won't mean anything in the live show. But you got to throw in little table jokes, little jokes, little inside jokes every once in a while because we're in there for four and a half hours. We're reading 40 sketches. You know, we need to, we need to, and it's more sketches probably than when you last hosted because there's more writers and more cast members probably than ever, you know. God they were interminable then I can only imagine how long they are now That my favorite day I going to be honest Table read is my favorite day That I have a lot of fun doing I like cold reading which is maybe I don know Do actors like cold reading? I sure do. I do. I do. I love cold reading. I feel like if you're good at it, you like it. I like it. It's athletic, you know, it keeps you nimble and you're already in the fun part to me. You're already in that fun part of figuring out the scenes, you know, figuring, you're already in the play part where it's like, well, we're not rolling yet. This isn't, this hasn't been defined, you know, it's not the day. So let's play around with these scenes and find stuff. And that's, that's the most fun part for me, you know. Who's your favorite host or surprising? I need a host moment. I always like those stories. Oh, man. The main answer that I always give is Owen Wilson, just because he was the first host I ever had. And he's from Texas. My wife's from Texas. I'm from Tennessee. So that was a very kind of warm first episode for me because he had never read cue cards before. I had never read cue cards before. So we were like learning the SNL skills at the same time, you know? And that really took some pressure off from me. More recently, Ariana Grande is like my, that's the homie. That's my girl. We really got along on the comedy side of things. And she's such a gifted impressionist. Like obviously she's the greatest singer in the world. but that those credits really transfer to her impressions ability and the first time that she hosted when I was there we had tried out a Celine Dion and Andrea Bocelli song together in a sketch like 10 seconds of one and had so much fun rehearsing that it didn't go to the show but I remember I just had fun being like oh I'm kind of keeping up with her this is fun I can almost sing this song. And then that didn't go. But I was like, if she ever comes back, I need to be on my shit. I need to work this out and I need to be able to... So I started legitimately singing more and stretching out more in my car in Tennessee. And when I had time, sometimes at two in the morning in New York when I'm walking around. If you're opening your window, you'll hear James Austin Johnson singing opera out there. I took it upon myself that if we ever were in the same room again and we could do that bit, that I would be ready to sing with her. And so we were able to do it on the Christmas episode this season. And that's really me singing. That's really her singing. And it was my Celine Dion, Andrea Bocelli bit dreams come true. I'd always wanted to do a comedy bit as Andrea Bocelli. And I got to. And Ariana's confidence in me and support of me is really what made that possible. I don't know that my bosses would have just let me do that just cold, just for no reason. And I think her endorsement gave me this big confidence boost. And I owe her a lot for that. because ever since then, I've kind of been like more, feeling more free and more confident in everything else I do at the show. I mean, that was a big moment for me this season was singing with her. That is a big moment. And it's great when hosts come in and take ownership, right? And really raise the bar. It changes things because it's like that is what the show is about. The show really is about making the host look good. like that's something that I've learned being there is like the cast is a really important part of the show and we all want to see their comedy bits but we're really there to lift up Rob Lowe we're there to lift up Ariana Grande we want this to be their week and their show and we want to give them the funniest show to do what they do best in and if they don't do live comedy great We want to find what they do do great and highlight that. We at least want to highlight what's fun. If we can help them have fun, that's what America wants to see. They want to see the host relaxing and showing this other side of themselves. And I mean, who else? John Mulaney. I don't think I'd be able to do my Bob Dylan impression on TV without John Mulaney. I mean, that guy. Right. Your Dylan impression is great. He always liked my Dylan impression. He heard it on a podcast a million years ago. And when he came, he did, you know, we have the promos. We have like a little short film promo that we do on Monday or Tuesday. And he was like, I want to do Bob Dylan is a new writer at SNL. And I was like, okay, I've been pitching Bob Dylan. I've been pitching present day Bob Dylan at SNL for years and they'll never do it. And John Mulaney said, I want to do it. And I was like, I'm right there with you, pal. And we did this promo where it was Bob Dylan, present day Bob Dylan, not the 60s Dylan with the little hat. I'm talking about present day Bob Dylan. He smoked one billion cigarettes. He tours constantly. He's in his 80s. And we did this promo where it was present day Bob Dylan as a new SNL writer. And then I've done Bob on the show like three more times since then because I had John's endorsement And that's the power of the host, power of the host. If you can find the right matchup with the right host and you make some magic happen, it can reverberate throughout history is what I'm trying to say. I could just see Lauren going, as much as it pains me to say it, the kids have no fucking idea who Dylan is. I did. I did get a note like that. When we did, it was Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen and Bono on the complete unknown red carpet. It's a minute and a half long sketch at the end of one of the shows. And it's the three rockers talking. It's that thing of like, you go to these premieres. And for me, when I go to a premiere, I go to a streaming event, whatever it is. For me, it's about what are the snacks? I want a glass of wine. I want a little glass of champ. And I want some finger foods. I'm always zeroed right in on the sliders. Where are the sliders? That's why I go to those events. I want some freaking sliders and I want a glass of sauvignon blanc and I want to chit-chat with the cast of the show. And so we wrote a whole sketch that was just about Bob being like, tired of the step and repeat. He's stuck with the BuzzFeed lady and he just wants to get to the chafing dishes of sliders. Like, release me, BuzzFeed. I'm trying to get to the sliders. I heard this poor sliders. And afterward, where I guess my Bob had talked too much about esoteric, you know, old Hollywood things. I had talked about a Lon Chaney movie from 1927. I had talked about a Dick Powell film noir. I had all these like Bob Dylan appropriate references within the sketch. And yeah, Lorne took me aside in between Dress and Aaron. He was like, Lon Chaney, Dick Powell. You know, our audience is like nine years old, right? We're going for the nine-year-olds. So just update the references. So he just wanted me to like be talking about present day people, you know. That's so, it's so good. It's so good. I don't know. Do you like Bob Dylan, Rob? Bob Dylan, I grew up, he grew up in my neighborhood on Point Doom. He would come to my soccer games. What? Dylan would come to the soccer games. Yeah. He would. Really? Yeah. Because his kids, Jesse Dylan and. Yeah. God, I'm going to blank on his other name. were my brother's age. They played on the same. Jacob, yeah. But it was mostly, I think Jesse was on my brother's soccer team. And so you'd see him. You grew up in Malibu? Yeah, yeah. Cool. From the time I was 12. I like Point Doom. It was a magical time, really different than, there were very few show business people, really. There were no agents or managers or tech billionaires. There was like Bob Dylan. Yeah. And who built, secretly built a big compound. No one knew it was him when he was building it. and it was like you rode your horse to the market. It was fucking insane. But Dylan was there. You'd see Dylan around, man. He was always very mysterious. It was like seeing Bigfoot. You'd get a sighting. It was like seeing a Bigfoot that was about 5'3", 5'4". That's right. A very, very small... Smallfoot. Smallfoot was there. Yeah, I got to get Bob Dylan and Martin Short side by side because I want to know who's taller. Oh, I mean, at least Martin is aptly named. I mean, they literally named him correctly. They named him correctly. Well, I'm here so we can start. That's as far as I've gotten on Martin Short. That's the closest I can get. That's another one of the voices that keeps knocking around where I'm like, maybe I'm going to figure out Martin Short. That's a good one. I don't think anybody's ever done him. I don't think anyone's ever done it. That's, it's all about the unexplored territory for me, Rob. It's all about, has someone figured it out? Can I find a new one? Or who's somebody no one's ever done? Let me try that. I did Arsenio Hall before anybody had done Arsenio Hall on SNL years ago. And I just couldn't believe that nobody had ever done, that nobody had ever done him. I just couldn't believe it. How did, how does your Arsenio Hall go? It was based on his way of asking questions. And Conan and Smigel wrote the sketch. So I was very well supported. But it was Arsenio had Linda Blair as a guest. And he's like, now, someone told me something about you doing something with somebody or something. What's that all about? I was like... He does like very leading, but also not... No information. No. Nothing to grab onto. No. No information. No. Like, it's just... But Lorne was like, you can't be doing Arsenio. I think that would be in poor taste. So we're going to call the character Arsenio Beckman. So that's what it was. It's on YouTube. It's one of my favorite things I've done. I'll go find it. Arsenio Beckman. that's so funny how they would do those kinds of things. Cause it's like, if you've got something that's next door to the person, you can just make it an original character. And it's not like any, everybody needs it to be the, the great impression. You know, it's not like anyone needs to be needs, needs you to say, I'm being Arsenio. The fact that you are capturing some Arsenio essence. Yeah, exactly. And then transferring it to this other sketch. It's like, it's almost more fun for people to, to give you this room to be more playful within it. Sometimes doing an impression of someone, you get stuck in their world and you want to widen the aperture. You want to make it more fun. And that's kind of what Carcinio is. Carcinio, yeah, was very similar to Carcinio. Yeah, because that lets them do all the Arsenio jokes, but then also lets them widen what they were doing with Carson. It was in that same time time frame. That was the era. Well, thank you, dude. This was so fun. I'm psyched. I hope you enjoy the rest of your stay. Have you been in this horrible ice storm down there in Nashville? I was able to avoid it in Nashville. My brother-in-law keeps driving by my house to make sure everything's okay down there. But so far, we seem to be good. You know, Tennessee, they're not prepared ever for winter. That winter happens every 25 years in the Southeast. But we had a lot of fun up here in New York. It's frigid temperatures, but it's been really clear and beautiful. And you couldn't ask for a better... I mean, you can't ask for better winter weather than a little bit of snow. It's bright. It's clear. You don't have to contend with the sleet and the actual precipitation. So my son has been going nuts. He just wants to stomp around in all the piss, dirt, snow, all this dirty, nasty New York snow. He wants to crunch on top of all of it. So that's the beauty of kids. You get to go to where they're at. Yeah, you meet them. You get to walk into what they're seeing. And it's like, I'm looking at piss and shit covered, pigeon shit covered snow. And my son sees a playground. And I'm like, that's beautiful. It's good stuff. Well, thank you, brother. This was so fun. Hopefully we get to do something one of these days we'll do. Oh, man, I'd love to work with you, man. We got to make it happen. Yeah, yeah. Let's, we'll start, put some sketches aside for my triumphant return. All right. All right. He's got, that was so fun. And now I'm thinking about like what obscure person I would like to try to imitate or have him imitate. Maybe that's a good thing for the lowdown line. If you guys have any good lowdown line imitations that you would like me to work on, that would be fun. I don't have to host Saturday Night Live. I can just do, you guys could be my Lorne and say, Rob, I think if you could do a Chalamet, it might be interesting. Anyway, thanks for listening, you guys. As always, big love out to everybody wherever you are and for taking the time to be with me today. And there's going to be more fun to be had next week right here on Literally. You've been listening to Literally with Rob Lowe, produced by me, Sean Doherty, with help from associate producer, Sean Calvano. Research by Jeff Fox. Engineering and mixing by Joanna Samuel. Our executive producers are Rob Lowe for Low Profile and Nick Liao, Adam Sachs, and Jeff Ross for Team Coco. Booking by Catherine Cook. Music by Devin Bryant. Special thanks to Hidden City Studios. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time on Literally.